It is officially spooky season and it is time to start watching all of our favorite scary movies. One of my favorite scary movies is “Beetlejuice.” This cult classic was all the rage when it was originally released in 1988 earning about $77 million at the box office. Naturally, the sequel was just as popular, with many fans wanting to see their favorite characters back on the big screen on Sep. 6, but was it worth the hype?
The sequel film “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” follows Lydia, Delia and Astrid, Lydia’s daughter, back in Winter River, Connecticut due to the news of Charles Deetz’s passing. The family goes through multiple hijinks throughout the movie, and we also see scenes about Beetlejuice’s adventures in the Netherworld as he avoids his ex-wife Dolores.
Sequel films are infamous for not adding on to the original movie, creating a strange absence in the movie. However, “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” does the opposite. In this movie we learn more about the Netherworld and Beetlejuice himself and we are no longer stuck in the stuffy waiting room or the long winding hallway. We see an additional soul train, an arrivals and departures processing area and there are even stores in the Netherworld. As far as Beetlejuice goes, we learn a bit about the time when he was still human and how he met Dolores.
Despite the fact that actors Geena Davis, Alec Baldwin, and Jeffery Jones were all absent from the film for various reasons, the movie was still able to provide an amazing performance with the actors giving it their all. Jenna Ortega, for example, did spectacular in her role as Astrid, making her all the goth moody teenager that Lydia originally was. While I was expecting Astrid to be similar to Ortega’s previous role in “Wednesday”, I was pleasantly surprised when I saw that she was played more as an original character than a copy.
The sequel had some amazing music as well. The film put a unique twist on Banana Boat, having it be sung by a children’s choir with a melancholic tone during Charles’ funeral. The movie included a large dance number as well, to the song MacArthur Park by Jimmy Webb and Richard Harris. However, I expected the movie to have songs that were upbeat like in the original, which I think would have been able to give the movie the additional fun element we saw in the first film.
I loved how the sequel was chock-full of references and easter eggs to the first movie. The beginning of the movie pays homage to the original as we see the credits play as the camera passes over the diorama from the first movie. Delia’s sculptures are another reference that show up multiple times, and the name “Deetz” appears outside of the art building of the school that Astrid is attending. There is another scene in the movie where we see Lydia’s new TV show called “Ghost House” which is a fun easter egg to how the original movie could have been called “Ghost House,” before it was changed to the ever classic “Beetlejuice.”
Although I initially had my doubts about the movie, I am glad I was able to enjoy the movie as much as I did when I saw it in theaters. While I do not expect a third movie, the film would not need one seeing as it was all nicely wrapped up.
